Tag Archives: AI

Nearly two-thirds of Americans expect humans to struggle finding work in a future of robots — all humans except themselves, that is. According to a study by Pew Research, they worry far less about losing their own jobs to automation.

Why it matters: The study confirms prior research that, despite the knowledge that a powerful new technological force is gathering momentum, Americans remain unperturbed about their own well-being, leaving themselves potentially vulnerable to personal financial crisis.

“For many people, this isn’t real until it actually happens to them,” Pew’s Aaron Smith, who led the project, told Axios. What they have yet to recognize is that “it’s not just something that’s going to happen to fast food workers and insurance clerks,” he said, but to people just like themselves.

What the studies say: The Pew report is a followup to a study it issued last year with similar findings. Likewise, a survey last month by Bloomberg Beta, a venture capital firm, found that just 12% of Americans worry about losing their job to automation. The surveys spring in large part from much-discussed 2013 research from Oxford University that said 47% of American jobs are at risk of automation by 2033.

The bottom line: Numerous experts challenge such pessimism, but regardless of what anyone thinks, there is very little dispute that a lot of people are going to lose their jobs. The only questions are whether they will find new work, and if so, how long it will take. Should dislocation occur on the scale some forecasters project, experts fear social chaos. “Some people will be taken by surprise, and nothing leads to instability more than frustrated expectations,” Bloomberg Beta’s Roy Bahat told Axios.

Axios reports that we are in a robot-and-artificial intelligence bubble, and experts are starting to push back. Among their gripes: over-the-top hype of AI’s capabilities and its near-term danger to society.

One of those grumblingis Rodney Brooks, a father of modern robotics. He tells Axios that we are not near an age of super-human machines — robots are here, but not about to take over:

“AI is not inherently powerful. In hundreds of years, it could be different. But we aren’t on the cusp of this.”

Some companies are making exaggerated claims of AI capability in their products.

Where we are now: In terms of commercial products, we are in an age of simple robots doing the simplest of tasks again and again, mainly because no one has yet invented one that reliably does something more complicated that is actually in demand. We are talking machines like the Roomba, the robot vacuum cleaner of which Brooks is a co-inventor. “Customers want something that out of the box will just work, at a price they want to pay,” he says. “And they don’t want to read a manual.”

Where we’re going: The greatest near-term need is robots that will help the elderly stay in their homes, he says. “We will be lucky if we have enough robots to fill the gaps needed for the aging population. They will be dumb robots.”